- end_line
- 4187
- extracted_at
- 2026-01-30T20:48:26.981Z
- extracted_by
- structure-extraction-lambda
- start_line
- 4145
- text
- has somewhere furnished you with his own picture. For poets (whether in
prose or verse), being painters by nature, are like their brethren of
the pencil, the true portrait-painters, who, in the multitude of
likenesses to be sketched, do not invariably omit their own; and in all
high instances, they paint them without any vanity, though at times with
a lurking something that would take several pages to properly define.
I submit it, then, to those best acquainted with the man personally,
whether the following is not Nathaniel Hawthorne;--and to himself,
whether something involved in it does not express the temper of his
mind,--that lasting temper of all true, candid men--a seeker, not a
finder yet:--
‘A man now entered, in neglected attire, with the aspect of a
thinker, but somewhat too roughhewn and brawny for a scholar. His
face was full of sturdy vigour, with some finer and keener
attribute beneath; though harsh at first, it was tempered with the
glow of a large, warm heart, which had force enough to heat his
powerful intellect through and through. He advanced to the
Intelligencer, and looked at him with a glance of such stern
sincerity, that perhaps few secrets were beyond its scope.
‘“I seek for Truth,” said he.’
Twenty-four hours have elapsed since writing the foregoing. I have just
returned from the haymow, charged more and more with love and admiration
of Hawthorne. For I have just been gleaning through the Mosses, picking
up many things here and there that had previously escaped me. And I
found that but to glean after this man, is better than to be in at the
harvest of others. To be frank (though, perhaps, rather foolish),
notwithstanding what I wrote yesterday of these Mosses, I had not then
culled them all; but had, nevertheless, been sufficiently sensible of
the subtle essence in them, as to write as I did. To what infinite
height of loving wonder and admiration I may yet be borne, when by
repeatedly banqueting on these Mosses I shall have thoroughly
incorporated their whole stuff into my being--that, I cannot tell. But
already I feel that this Hawthorne has dropped germinous seeds into my
soul. He expands and deepens down, the more I contemplate him; and
further and further, shoots his strong New England roots into the hot
soil in my Southern soul.
- title
- Chunk 14